The present invention relates generally to feeding apparatuses and, more particularly, to an apparatus for feeding passbooks and other legal documents from a storage area to a customer retrieval area.
In recent years, there has been a trend to automate banking functions as they relate to bank customers. Examples of this trend is the Automatic Teller Machines (ATM's) which provides remote banking functions without the presence of a bank teller. Presently, the ATM's are limited to issuing money and receipts, both of which comprise single-sheet documents. Other banking functions which have been investigated is the automatic issuance of passbooks and other types of multiple-sheet documents such as bonds or certificates of deposit. An example of a prior art passbook issuing apparatus may be found in U.S. Pat. No. 4,280,036. The limitations found in the prior art is that, due to the thickness of the cover of the passbook, the passbook has been required to be inserted into the printing and feeding apparatus in an open condition wherein the apparatus prints on the pages of the passbook and then feeds the open passbook to a discharged area.
It is therefore a principal object of this invention to provide a system for automatically issuing passbooks in a closed condition from a storage area. It is another object of this invention to provide an automatic passbook issuing system in which data inputted by a customer or a bank clerk through an input terminal device is printed on the passbook after which the passbook is transported to a discharged area.